[For The Night Manager – “Part Four” or any other recaps on Fetchland, assume the presence of possible spoilers.]

AMC Summary:
Part Four. Pine becomes part of Roper’s inner circle; Burr questions the safety of her source.

This Night Manager – “Part Four” would be better titled “They Finally Do It” … but instead we have the gloriously descriptive, “Part Four”. Our title works for two reasons, Pine finally sticks it to Jed and, in the main plot line, Roper finally does his arms deal. Technically, though it’s actually Andrew Birch who does the deal, signs the papers, and provides the retinal scan. This is also the episode where they finally reveal to us just how despicable Roper really is. of course, we’ve heard how he’s the “worst man in the world” but thanks to Angela Burr’s storytelling in “Part Four” we truly get the picture.

Speaking of “picture” this show integrates current cellphone technology into the story in a perfunctory manner. Why more spy stories don’t do this these days makes no sense. Of course spies would be using their phones all the time! It’s the most realistic thing about “The Night Manager” and gives it a sense of “now” that works. The episode opens with Roper explaining to Pine how he’s the straw man in the arms deal. He’ll play Andrew Birch and all the contract signing and dealing will be done in his name. Then Danny and Jed come in so Roper can say goodbye to his son as he goes back to be with his mother, location classified.

Speaking of classified, Burr has a secret meeting with Harry, an MI6 agent from her old days working there. Harry says Halo is Dromgoole, the head of MI6, and Felix is Langley in London. They’re falsifying MOD certificates with Harry’s help. This is corruption and fraud. So, a contrite Harry gives her helpful documents that she and Steadman analyze with their team. Through these docs, Angela finds out Roper and Langbourne are on a plane to Instanbul with a man named Andrew Birch. Burr then realizes that Pine may now be Andrew Birch.

Jed then confronts Pine, asking if he’s Andrew Birch, Thomas Quince, or Johnathan Pine. He says he can’t tell her. For some reason this mystery gets Jed really hot. So, they go up to his room and do it. Question now is whether Andrew Birch is a sentimental schmuck like Pine with his lady in Cairo or more like the douchebag he was as Thomas Quince in Devon – just lovin and leavin them. Or perhaps Birch is a new brand of blue-eyed babe. He certainly seems comfortable in Roper’s world now.

Meanwhile Roper talks with Langbourne about how Halo and Felix at MI6 are getting skittish. In fact, they’re extremely agitated because they now know Burr has Harry’s documents implicating them in the deal. Halo and Felix assume it was Apostel that snitched. So, guess who’s found dead at the end of the episode? Yes, Apostel’s a goner. This means we need to worry about Burr now. Our pregnant hero faces imminent danger from all sides.

The next day during the contract signing part of the deal the sellers do a biometric iris scan of Andrew Birch and take a look at his bank account, which miraculously contains three hundred million dollars. Pine’s come a long way from being “The Night Manager” now.

Part two of the deal takes place late at night on a cargo ship. The sellers then do another retinal scan on Birch and the purchase gets authorized. They give Birch/Pine special vodka and convey the arms from their cargo ship onto Roper’s trucks. The next day Roper, Langbourne, and Birch will fly out to the buyer with enough weapons to start a war.

Monitoring from her office Burr tells a coworker about when she first learned about Richard Roper. Burr calls it “School Sports Day,” an event she attended in Baghdad while stationed there. At an outdoor park families were playing sports and celebrating with picnics when someone released Sarin gas at the event. This tortured and killed 112 children and 58 adults. Burr saw Richard Roper at “School Sports Day” taking it all in and then he started selling Sarin soon after. So, she knows Roper got the idea from seeing that horror. What she saw as a tragedy he saw as a great way to make lots of money. This was the origin for Burr’s obsession with nailing him.

Late that night Jed calls Pine “just to know he’s there” but instead of cooing back, he tells her to get off the line. Pine knows Burr’s team is listening. The next morning Angela says Pine’s in too deep. Pine retorts that Burr can’t nail Roper without him. She’s certain to get him, though, as long as the operation goes forward. Angela still insists Pine has to flee the operation but Instead he notifies Roper that being monitored by police. So, Roper calls for a full evacuation, everybody on the road in ten minutes. Pine leaves with Roper, off the grid now and officially pisses off Burr who’s mad pregnant at this point. Anyone familiar with pregnancy rage knows that the real action hasn’t even started yet on “The Night Manager” so stay tuned for the inevitable blitzkreig.

–Katherine Recap

[For The Night Manager “Part Three” or any other recaps on Fetchland, assume the presence of possible spoilers.]

AMC Summary:
Part Three. Pine uncovers secrets about other members of Roper’s household; Burr and Steadman recruit someone.

The third part of The Night Manager opens at the Madrid home of Apostel, one of Roper’s arms dealer business buddies. He’s having a party for his teen daughter’s birthday and makes a spectacle of giving her, “The most expensive necklace” in front of all the party guests. Then Apostel talks business with Langbourne and dances with Jed until one of the maids calls him away because his daughter has just hung herself in the bathroom. Jed is then disappointed when Roper blows off the birthday girl’s death in a callous manner saying she inconvenienced his meeting schedule with her suicide.

Then Frisky brings Pine’s to meet with Roper and Corcoran soon joins to interrogate Pine about his “sordid” past. “Makes a man wonder who you really are,” Roper says. Then he suggests maybe it’s time for Pine to become somebody new since there’s a worldwide warrant out for him. Pine acts like he’s gonna leave but he can’t. It turns out Roper has confiscated his passport. They want him to stay in the cottage down the beach until Roper figures out what to do with him. It’s a forced welcome into the fold. Corky, though, still doesn’t trust him and wishes he’d just walk into the sea with stones in his pockets, Virginia Woolf style.

Burr tries to watch Roper’s island retreat machinations through binoculars from across the water but can’t see much. Pine jogs and plays tennis with Roper, then he asks to take Danny into town for a change of scenery. As they’re leaving Corky tells Pine he noticed a gap in his history and he’s going to find out where Pine was and what he was doing during that time. So, on his outing with Danny, Pine lures Burr over to listen in on his conversation with the boy. In this scene we see that Burr’s pregnancy has advanced quite a bit so Pine must have been with Roper many months at this point. Through his conversation with Danny, Pine alerts Burr that Corcoran is investigating the gap in his resume, in other words – his time in Cairo. In a later scene Danny also reveals to Pine that Roper’s got a secret hidden room off his bedroom that he calls “The Citadel” with a special key and an alarm they check every day at eleven.

Meanhwile Steadman tells Burr that since Apostel’s daughter killed herself he’s been attending church daily and even called the investigators in Madrid to say he has information about a big arms deal about to go down. The guy’s contrite as fuck. So, Burr approaches him at church and tells him she’s his guardian angel. She claims that if Roper wasn’t in Apostel’s life maybe his daughter wouldn’t have killed herself. Although this isn’t really logical or even a reasonable thing for a stranger to say, Apostel isn’t thinking clearly. Burr then tells him he can find redemption by assisting her and taking down Roper. The first step will be extricating Corky from Roper’s inner circle. Right away Burr puts Apostel to this task.

Next we finally see the big meeting between Apostel, Roper, and Langbourne. During it Pine listens in on Jed talking to her mother and crying. He interrupts to tell her the guests are arriving and sees her partially naked in the process – just a side boob, really. But much is made of it by Pine who apologizes later. During the party he and Jed go for a walk along the beach and she says she doesn’t care who sees her naked but makes him promise not to tell anyone she was crying. Then Jed strips down and skinny dips to prove her point about nudity and though Pine refuses to join her in the water, it’s obvious he wants to. We’re meant to understand that women are Pine’s speical weakness and yeah, we get it. He’s here in this mess to avenge a woman he literally slept with once. But guess what? Being into women isn’t really so unique. It’s what straight guys do. You’re not so freaking special, Pine!

While at the meeting Apostel tells Langbourne that “Mr. Bargatti,” the guy with the arms to sell, is concerned about Corky and thinks he’ll run off at the mouth because he’s a big drinker. So, when Langbourne passes along this info to Roper, he starts alienating Corky a bit from the inner circle. Corcoran is an instinctual fellow and immediately senses something is off. Speaking of Langbourne, it turns out that hot potato teen he was flirting with isn’t his daughter at all. She’s the family nanny. We were right about him screwing her, though. Langbourne’s wife tells Pine all about it on the sexy end of the pool where all the action seems to happen at Roper’s place. She also divulges a ton of insider info about the arms deal going on between Bargatti, Apostel and Roper. Her motivation for this seems rather implausible as all she gets out of it is a half-ass back rub from Pine while he puts sunscreen on her. Then Pine sends a surreptitious text to Burr and Steadman using Danny’s cellphone to give them all the dirt Ms. Langbourne told him about the arms deal.

Next there’s a big Roper meeting in Monaco but Corky and Pine aren’t invited. While Jed and Corky are out galavanting, Pine goes through Jed’s personal effects and finds a picture of her little boy and the secret Citadel key. Right at eleven am he uses the “testing the alarm” frame to enter The Citadel and take pictures of Roper’s secret documents. While there he finds a distinctive golden hair that clearly belongs to Jed. When she comes home and finds him there Pine tells Jed she has to be more careful about leaving evidence that she broke into his office and spied on his papers. So, now they share two secrets, well three if you count the nudity but Jed doesn’t count that.

Speaking of secrets, one of the MI6 peeps meets with Roper and Langbourne to tell them about Burr and Steadman’s operation. So, he’s a double agent of sorts and then it turns out Halo itself – a division of MI6 is in on the whole deal. This is also in the documents Pine photographed. Then Roper and Jed have a huge fight over the phone where she accuses him of hiding stuff and he confronts her about having a secret kid. Meanwhile Pine’s texting the documents he photographed to Burr and Steadman. This is when they discover Halo’s involvement. In this rapid unfurling of two parallel secrets, the truth comes out on both sides of the story, personal and business.

When Roper’s back from Monaco he has a present for Pine, a new identity and passport but first Pine needs to witness a document for Roper. He’s going to be Andrew Stephen Birch now and sign on to a “new company” with this new name. Best line from “Part Three” of The Night Manager is when Pine asks about what he’s signing and Langbourne says, “Jesus, for a murderer on the run you’re pretty bloody picky”. While reading it over Pine sees that he’s officially replacing Corky as Roper’s right hand man. Then as “Part three” concludes Roper says, “Welcome to the family, Andrew,” and thus Pine’s in like Flynn. We can only presume/hope he’ll ruin this picture perfect postcard family situation by banging Jed in the near future. That beautiful face of his is just begging for another beating. At least we think so.

–Katherine Recap

[For The Night Manager “Part Two” or any other recaps on Fetchland, assume the presence of possible spoilers.]

AMC Summary:
Part Two. On the island of Mallorca, Roper’s life of luxury is ruined; Burr continues recruiting Pine.

The Night Manager continues with the same black and white take on the world for this second part although it does make a grand effort to muss up the hair of our hero, Jonathan Pine. His new boss even tries to make him eat a cookie (biscuit cause they’re Brits) after saying, “You’re too perfect Pine!” exasperated. So, Pine spends this part of the story dirtying his britches and creating a dark legend about himself so Roper will want to hire him and he can infiltrate the worst man in the world’s empire.

“Part Two” opens as gorgeous half-naked Jed gets an unwelcome phone call from her mother. She’s brusque with her mummy and then asks about “Billy” and her mother gets nasty saying, “As if you care. They say he doesn’t even ask about you anymore,” which makes Jed cry. Then she says the money’s coming at the end of the month right before her mother tells her not to forget that she’s a dirty whore. So, then Jed swallows about half a bottle of pills, puts on a dress, and joins Roper, his son, Danny, and some friends to go for a fancy dinner. They speedboat to another part of the island in two parallel boats, then disembark at a divine dining spot. One of Roper’s buddies is a chap named Lord Langbourne who dances creepily close with his teenage daughter after dinner.

Then a robbery rudely interrupts their frivolity. Guys with guns and tattoos take their jewelry and money but then also seize Danny for ransom. Corcoran, Roper’s right hand man, offers them a swift one hundred thousand dollars and Jed tries to get them to take her instead. But she’s broken, along with Roper, when they take the boy and leave saying they’ll contact Roper with further instructions soon. Because Danny’s quite young, maybe eight at the oldest, it’s pretty tragic even though it’s also during this scene that we find out Roper’s bodyguards are named after cats – Frisky and Tabby. Maybe it’s partly sad because that first scene showed Jed’s lack of “Billy” and then the dinner reveals her close bond with Danny. So, in the back of our minds we’re thinking this relationship with Roper’s son is her way of replacing “Billy,” who’s probably her son. As the kidnappers leave with Danny they spy someone watching them and, of course, it turns out to be Pine.

Next the story slips back to six months before as Burr enlists Pine for the Roper insider job. Angela promises to resettle him after they nail Roper; with a new name, job, and life. All he has to do is help her nail Richard Roper. She tells him they’ll have to create a fake criminal record for Pine so that Roper will discover it, “And not a word to the River House,” she warns – that means MI6 and thus Pine’s permanent record. In the next scene Pine joins her ready for his assignment and he even wears an army green jacket to prove it. When Burr says he’s too perfect she tells Pine to drill down to his deepest inner psychopath and mine that part of himself for material every minute of the day. He’s gotta become comfortable being the second worst man in the world now until this job is done.

During his transition into second worst man, Pine begins a violent career as a local drug dealer in a small town. He literally shoves drugs down the throats of future customers before threatening their lives if they don’t buy his drugs from now on. In his free time Pine watches Youtube videos of Roper talking about his philanthropy project and then runs the hills and valleys with gear strapped all over him like a heavily armed air force ranger. During this period of time Pine also breaks the heart of a local single mother, gets into a barroom brawl, and steals another identity. He’s thus cemented himself into the echelon of “bad guy” presumably enough to now move on to his real goal of infiltrating Roper’s inner circle.

Meanwhile Andrea teams up with American agent, Joel Steadman who specializes as an enforcer against illegal arms dealers. He and Angela know each other and go out for a drink after he speaks at a meeting with the British intelligence team. Steadman tells her about his latest mission to move against Roper. He’s in Madrid now and was behind a meeting between Lord Langbourne and a shady lawyer. Steadman got pictures of the meeting but nothing actionable. Burr says she can help him do even better work but needs financial help for her “inside man” in return. Angela’s pregnancy is revealed at this stage as a minor subplot just so that we’re all clear that Burr’s the madonna to counterbalance Jed’s whore.

Then we see Pine in Mallorca saving Danny from the kidnappers and sending him back to Jed and Roper. Turns out he’d paid the kidnappers to “make it look real” but then right after Danny leaves Pine attacks them so they’ll come at him hard. He succeeds and they end up beating him nearly to death. The kidnappers leave Pine to die and (once returned to his relieved Roper parents) Danny points him out as the one who saved him. Roper recognizes him as Pine and says they’ll take care of him and protect him from now on. Corcoran then runs a background check on Pine which Angela and Steadman hear about from their home base. So, now they know he was successful at getting inside. They follow up with a warrant for his arrest so Roper will take him deep into the fold. Angela explains to Steadman that since Pine’s crossed the bridge it’s now their turn to burn it.

Pine’s a wreck. All bloody bruises and bandages, he rides via private ambulance to Roper’s Mallorca island retreat. Jed wakes him for a hazy “hello” at the house at one point just to ask if there’s anyone they should call but he doesn’t answer. Danny thanks him for saving his life and reads to him from a book about sea creatures but Pine doesn’t seem to notice. Eventually after much time has passed, Pine can sit up. Now it’s Corcoran’s turn for a visit with Pine. Roper’s right hand man makes it clear he doesn’t trust Pine. He tells Pine he knows how he stole from the hotel in the Alps where he worked. Then Corcoran says he thinks Pine’s stringing them along and not really as bad off as he seems. Frisky, the bodyguard, isn’t particularly friendly with him either but Pine’s got his sea blue eyes on the cold cycle. He’s not feelin’ shit these days, folks.

In the last scene we see Roper arrive home in a helicopter and then come straight inside to see Pine. He sits on the edge of the bed next to him and pulls the sheet up over Jonathan’s chest. “You sleep now… and tomorrow we’ll find out who you really are,” he says. This ending points to a theme we see throughout “Part Two” – the idea of secret identities. Pine has three different identities in the episode. Jed has her secret “Billy” and her hidden mother. Roper has his philanthropist facade and loving father role to keep up along with the weighty burden of maintaining his street cred as worst man in the world. Even Angela adds quite a wrinkle to her identity after being an intelligence officer for twenty years, with her newfound motherhood role. And now Pine is about to take on his most challenging identity of all, Roper insider. Here’s hoping for some sexytime in the next installment of The Night Manager. Maybe between Pine and Jed? This would help grant even a tiny morsel of truth to the claim of “ruining Roper’s life” the AMC summary claimed for “Part Two”. Roper lost his son for less than an hour and then everything went back to normal in his luxurious life. Let’s see some real ruin, AMC! We want Pine to bring on the pain.

–Katherine Recap